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Which Game Series Would You Reboot?

Posted by Soulskill on from the star-control-please dept.

Franchise reboots are all the rage these days in Hollywood, and the trend is starting to creep into the games industry as well. The Guardian's games blog is running a story discussing a few examples and pondering likely candidates for future reboots. Quoting: "If anything, the concept of the reboot makes more sense in the videogame sector than it does in movies. For a start, games are complex entities, with each new iteration in a familiar series adding many, many hours of fresh narrative content. Entering, say, the Zelda, Resident Evil, Half-Life, Dragon Quest or Metal Gear worlds at this stage must be massively intimidating — even if the developers go to great lengths to make each entry work as a singular, self-contained entity within the canon. Also, videogames are going through a paradigm shift in terms of popular appeal at the moment. The faithful audience of young males has been joined by new demographics brought in by the Wii, PC casual games, and now the iPhone. Many of these people may be vaguely aware of long-running game brands, but won't have a clue about the key characters, sign post events and basic gameplay mechanisms." So, which series (or individual title) would you like to see rebooted?

19 of 1,120 comments (clear)

  1. Rogue or Nethack by thomasdz · · Score: 5, Funny

    I would mix up all the letters.

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  2. Not all series need reboots by Drakkenmensch · · Score: 5, Funny

    Spiro's been rebooting with every new iteration from the original game and on. How else could you explain that he keeps forgetting how to breathe fire?

  3. The summary is dark, by swb311 · · Score: 5, Funny

    All the crappy games listed should be eaten by a grue.

  4. Space Quest by noundi · · Score: 5, Interesting

    A humorous game series about a deep space janitor solving mysteries. There is no better plot.

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    1. Re:Space Quest by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I don't think we need a reboot of the Space Quest franchise as much as we just need another Space Quest game.

      Sierra had one in the works (as in at least parts of the game were playable) about 5-6 years ago, but it was canceled. I don't think they ever disclosed publicly that they were working on it, but I know someone who was on the dev team. It sounded like they were staying pretty faithful to the spirit of the originals, although that may have been their downfall - sci-fi comedy is sort of a niche market, and Space/King's Quest-style old-school adventure games definitely are. Sierra is (or was at the time at least) basically the most cancel-happy publisher of all time, so I'm sure it didn't take much for them to get cold feet.

      Posted anonymously to protect the guilty.

  5. Descent! by Kilz · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I would love to see a remake of any of the descent series remade. I still have each of them and from time to time have to play them even though they are getting old.

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    1. Re:Descent! by autoevolution · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Descent was good but Descent: Freespace and Freespace 2 were great too. In particular the epic storyline, intrigue, unpredictability, immersion and voice acting, I feel, is unrivaled even compared to todays games. The missions would start off with really detailed briefings planning how everything should work, making the player think that everything will go according to the briefing, then nothing goes as planned, just like in real life. There were missions where you don't even win or aren't expected to win, whereas nowadays your games are like this "heres the missions go do it, oh you succeeded horay!".

    2. Re:Descent! by kevin42 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      As one of the Kahn developers (another one of them is sitting in the office next to mine), and one of the programmers of Descent 3 I have to respond.

      First off, the Kahn/Kali days were loads of fun, playing Descent 1 over the internet back in 1996 is a great memory I still have.

      IMO, the problems with D3 was that we never got the scale right for flying. D1/D2 had a feeling of speed because the tunnels were smaller and simpler. In D3 the designers tried to achieve a sense of massive complexes, which meant larger rooms and tunnels plus outdoor terrain. The problem there was the sense of flying fast was lost. I think this is the thing that disappointed most Descent fans. But I don't think that is what kept it from being a commercial success. I think the problem there was 1) feature creep made the development of D3 cost too much, 2) As you mentioned, the game was released in an era that had loads of hardware video card driver issues, which lead to tons of returns, and IMO the biggest issue: 3) Descent fatigue (lots of people bought D1/D2 because it was a unique idea, but by D3 they had already been there and done that).

      Contrary to what you say though, D3 wasn't primarily developed for Glide. It was originally developed for Glide, but that's because at the time development started that was the only real option. A lot of effort was put into OpenGL, but there were constant driver issues causing us grief.

      Also, I'm not sure what you mean about complaining about the use of TCP/IP for the online game play. I wrote the network layer for D3 (the same layer is used for other games including Freespace II if I remember correctly), and it used only UDP/IP for in game play. I think a lot of the complaints about laggy play were unfair given the networks people were playing over (no fast action game works well when pings get to 700ms or more).

      I'd love to be involved with Descent again, but I really doubt it will happen.

      BTW, my son was born right after D3 was released, and he really likes to play it now, which is pretty cool.

  6. Deus Ex by thisnamestoolong · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This game NEEDS to be remade -- the story, characters, and gameplay mechanics are just about the best ever, but are trapped in an awful game engine with atrocious AI. Even with the major flaws, I still play through it about once a year. I would LOVE to see it remade with a modern engine, with all the rough edges smoothed out (and without the dumbed down, console-friendly interface of the PoS sequel!), and the story line and environments fleshed out a little bit further. That would be beyond an epic win.

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  7. Games of my youth! by confu2000 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    X-Com! Star Control! Especially given that the most recent sequels were horrible.

  8. Wing Commander by Faizdog · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The original Wing Commander games were great. For some reason the gaming industry has moved away from space fighter simulators. Which is disappointing, that was an early genre that was a lot of fun.

    I particularly have fond memories of Wing Commander Armada, which combined in strategy elements. You had to explore planets, mine resources and build factories and ships, and you had to do it carefully. When your fleet met the enemies, it switched to the traditional fighter simulator. Even then though, you had a fleet of ships with goals, and you could switch control between them.

    I'd love to see Wing Commander, or some other space fighter, done with today's technology.

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  9. Are you listening Lucasarts?` by Darth_brooks · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Grim Fandango. Just for the thought of being able to roam around in a full 3d environment with Manny would be awesome. Not that was a game that had style.

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  10. Hrmm by acehole · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Syndicate ...and if I was being blasphemous, The last ninja

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  11. X-Wing vs Tie Fighter by Drakkenmensch · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Dual solo campaigns (rebels and empire) and massive multiplayer dogfights, complete with capital ships. Hell yeah.

  12. Shadowrun by Pingh · · Score: 5, Insightful

    We need a true shadowrun game. Nothing at all like the multiplayer shooter MS released. A true old school cyberpunk game. On a completely unrelated note, MDK could use revisiting.

  13. Re:Final Fantasy by imadoofus · · Score: 5, Funny

    I agree, you spoony bard!

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  14. Re:Final Fantasy by Yosho · · Score: 5, Informative

    I would reboot Final Fantasy and make many of the characters less cheesy.

    If you think the characters are cheesy, that's one thing, but why do you think this needs a "reboot"? What does "reboot" even mean here, given that almost every game has nothing to do with any of the other games in the series?

    I would also make the subject matter a bit darker

    Which FF game are you talking about? A number of the FF games have had fairly dark plots underneath their superficially colorful graphics; FF6, Tactics, 10, and 12 all come to mind immediately.

    the interactions more free form

    So... you want the series to basically stop being like a Japanese RPG and be more like a Western RPG?

    I think it would also be nice to have a non-turn-based combat option.

    FF 4 through 9, 11, and 12 all fit that bill. If you didn't mean "turn-based" but actually meant, "I want a battle system where characters don't line up in rows and swing at each other", there's still 11 and 12.

    I could be wrong, but it sounds like you're basing your opinion of the entire series off of just one or two of the games.

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  15. Commander Keen by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I still religiously play Commander Keen every year or so. Even today, bouncing mushroom, slugs, and kid heroes in football helmets don't get old. I would love to see a remake, as long as it stays true to the original series.

  16. Gold Box Series! Dungeon Keeper! Wing Commander! by Talonius · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The originals - Pool of Radiance, Curse of the Azure Bonds, Secret of the Silver Blades, Pools of Darkness. Wrap them in one long game. Tie them together a little more neatly. Remove the reliance on journals. (Although I will admit the translation wheel and journal were awesome in the day, now they only serve as a distraction -- dig through the box, find the manual, read the entry - and that's only if I've managed to forget what the entry was, which isn't likely.)

    Remaking the games and giving PoR and CotAB the Fix command in camp would be nice. Updating the graphics would be nice. But the game play - what I refer to as fantasy based squad level combat, not role playing - could be hugely improved. You could add role playing elements by expanding the options in the games for solving the puzzles. Make the players think more in quite a few of the situations they found themselves in.

    Though, SotSB could probably be left out to die. I don't have many fond memories of it. And this probably doesn't qualify as a reboot so much as a remake. And WotC, or whoever holds the AD&D license now, would insist on using 4e rules which would change the flavor of the game entirely...

    Dungeon Keeper would be a fantastic game to see re-imagined. Eye of the Beholder. I'd enjoy seeing what some of the darker personalities of the world could do with the Warcraft lore, given the chance. Space simulations need to come back -- picked up FreeSpace and FreeSpace 2 at Good Old Games (http://www.gog.com) and loved 'em; they're made even better with the FreeSpace Source Code Project created by the source code release by Volition. (Hm, have they already been rebooted, or just remade? There are several new campaigns...)

    Wing Commander would be awesome to see revived. Ultima would be a fantastic series to see reimagined, especially the first three (which I never liked all that much due to the space portions). RIP Origin. :|

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